Daydreaming walking across Dublin every day to work

In the Health+family supplement in The Irish Times yesterday. It makes for a lovely read. Fionnula Ward walks across the city to her school in south Dublin. No headphones, just the sights and all the daydreaming

My pension, Gaza – thoughts flicker into existence on my walk, burn for a while and disappear

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I walk to work most days, leaving the house at about 7am. It takes me roughly an hour and 15 minutes to negotiate my way from the north side of Dublin to the south.

My trek across the city bears little or no resemblance to hiking or hill walking. It’s not tramping as the New Zealanders like to say, or bushwalking which is what they do in Australia. This is city-walking. And city-walking, generally, if not always, has a purpose.

I have a destination. It never changes. And I have to get there by a certain time.

I do this walk freestyle. Like one of those climbers on a cliff face, swinging their way from rock to rock without a harness, I walk without earphones. Maybe not so much like freestyle climbers, now that I think of it. But still, I don’t listen to anything.

Which helps you notice things.

Nothing profound. Pretty basic. But I guess it’s good to notice. How suddenly it’s not so dark when you’re leaving the house. How week on week the brightness creeps in earlier and earlier.

I’d love to be able to say that this makes me very present in the moment, but I’m afraid that’s not the case. The usual takes hold. Thoughts flicker into existence, burn for a while and disappear into the nothingness.

I fantasise about retiring with a full pension. I worry about that damp mark on the ceiling of the extension. I fret over climate change. I figure out my food shopping and whether I should try out that recipe a friend sent. It seems easy enough and sounds delicious and then images of the horrors in Gaza will come to mind or of a refugee camp in Yemen that I saw on the news and I’ll have the briefest of revelations of how lucky I am, and then it’s back to my pension.

Fragments of memory

And, of course, fragments of memory will appear and disappear.

A sight, a smell, a sound and suddenly people long deceased will be there, right beside me, and in an instant gone again.

Meanwhile, I’m on O’Connell Street or crossing the Liffey and then I’m among the delivery vans outside the shops on Grafton Street. It’s not quite as idyllic as it might sound. There are no whistling, apron-clad men in caps with trays of freshly baked goods heading through open doors. Maybe there never were. It’s just people doing their job, occasionally pausing, devices in hand to check inventory.

The bus is quicker. The 9 or 16 will get me there in under an hour and I’m no martyr to the cause. I’ll head to the bus stop if the weather is bad or if I have to be in early for any reason.

But daydreaming can’t be done on a bus. Not for me, anyway. The phone takes hold. And, anyway, high-quality daydreaming needs repetitive motion to get the brain churning up all those random bits and pieces lodged within.

I work in a school and sometimes catch glimpses of children staring out a window or sitting on the steps in the yard looking at nothing in particular. But then children are good at daydreaming and they’re good at watching – at taking things in. Much better than their grown-up counterparts. They don’t need to be moving from A to B or doing something physical.

Schools are frenetic places and they know at some level that they need a chill-out every now and then.

Not so long ago, I spotted one under a picnic table we have beside the side wall.

He had climbed into the space between the benches and was squatting there on his own, his arms resting on one of the wooden supports, staring out at the comings and goings.

All okay? I inquired.

Fine, he grinned and went back to his observations.

Friends are surprised that I do this. I’m not a driver, but I can understand the appeal of a warm, comfortable car. And time can be a factor, of course, as well as responsibilities for others. I’m single and can walk out the door with no repercussions for anyone.

And Dublin is not a particularly pedestrian-friendly city. It’s all about the car and how efficiently it can make its way through the urban landscape – where it can turn, where it can park and all of that.

But it’s is not the worst place to walk either.

And when I arrive to school, the blood is up and I’m good to go.

Then hours later, I’ll slip my Leap card into my back pocket for the trip home. The bus beckons this time around.

Once a day is enough.

It’s so easy to miss what’s right in front of our noses

This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column.

Michael Commane

William Anders died on June 7 while piloting a small plane, which crashed near Washington state.

He was one of the first three astronauts to orbit the moon in 1968 along with Jim Lovell and Frank Borman. 

On one of the mission’s lunar orbits he took the now famous picture of the earth rising over the lunar surface, which was later described as the most influential environmental photograph ever taken.

Anders, while still orbiting the moon, said: ‘Here we come all the way to see the moon to discover the earth’.

It is a brilliant line. All the engineering, all the development and cost to learn about the moon and what happens, they see the earth and its wonder.

In many ways, it’s that old cliche of missing the wood for the trees.

Last week while stopped on my bicycle at traffic lights on Dublin’s O’Connell Street there was a young man cleaning the pavement. I was impressed with the detail he was giving to picking up rubbish. He certainly caught my attention. It was an unseasonably cold morning, I should have been wearing a coat, and I noticed he wisely had a scarf wrapped around his neck. Maybe that’s  how our conversation began. I’m curious by nature, which meant I was firing questions at him and he was answering them as fast as he could. 

He was explaining how Dublin City Council has people out cleaning the pavements and emptying bins all day long.

The traffic lights changed many times during our conversation. I asked him if he and his team were making a few euro in collecting cans and plastic bottles in the Return scheme. That led on to an interesting chat. He told me that a group of this colleagues had pooled together and with their earnings managed to buy three air fryers. 

He explained to me the early shift that he was on that day was not very profitable. The cans and plastic bottles would be appearing later in the day. At this stage we were both laughing. 

But he did point out that management had no problem with this practice once it did not interfere in their day’s work. I think he also said that there were plans afoot to set up a system whereby they could donate to some charity or other. 

I carried on that day about my business, doing the things I had to do. I have no doubt that my traffic light conversation enriched my day and I got the distinct impression he too enjoyed our chat. It might even have been the highlight of my day.

It’s so easy to miss what’s right in front of our noses, chasing after rainbows and of course realising it was a waste of a journey. I often wonder in our rush to be somewhere else, do something different, be different, are we missing what it means to be authentic and real. And there is also the added advantage of what we can learn from other people. In his Booker wining novel ‘Prophet Song’Paul Lynch writes about happiness hiding in the humdrum. Spot on.

Meath bishop apologises for hurt caused by parish curate

The Catholic bishop of Meath, Thomas Deenihan has apologised for the ‘hurt’ caused by a priest in his diocese, who posted a number of memes supporting far right-wing parties and conspiracy theories on his Facebook page.

Fr Fergal Cummins, who is a curate in Tullamore-Durrow in the diocese of Meath, has regularly posted on Facebook. According to yesterday’s Sunday Independent, topics included Covid-19 vaccines; that there is a UN Agenda 2030, whose goals include creating a one world government, the end of the family unit, the end of all private property, world depopulation and fertility control, the end of private farms and the end of animal ownership.

Elsewhere Fr Cummins posted a picture of Taoiseach Simon Harris, with the headline ‘Weak Men Allow Evil to Happen’ and ‘get them out’.

The posts have now been removed from Facebook.

According to Google Fr Cummins is closely associated with many agencies, including Radio Maria.

Did Fr Cummins in the past criticise comments made by Fr Brendan Hoban?

On the Youth 2000 newsletter he wrote a Gospel reflection for Sunday, November 27, 2022, which includes the following extract:

"A brief reminder that during Advent, each day, I strongly encourage you all: ~

1. In the morning (before work): Spend 10-15min in silent prayer & read four chapters of your Bible.
2. In the afternoon: go for a walk and pray both the rosary and the chaplet of divine mercy.
3. In the evening: Read a holy book for 30min (on the saints or the virtues) & examine your conscience."

More victims, more episcopal apologies but little change

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops apologised on Friday for the church’s role in traumatising Native American children at boarding schools until the mid-1900s.

The bishops’ apology on Friday did not refer specifically to sexual abuse, even though the Washington Post found at least 122 priests, sisters and brothers at 22 Catholic-run boarding schools who were later accused of sexually abusing Native American children under their care. 

The bishops said, “These multigenerational traumas continue to have an impact today, one that is perpetuated by racism and neglect of all kinds. Through our listening sessions, we heard that many Indigenous people feel unaccepted by and unwelcomed in society and even the Church.”

That all reads fine, and the church has had no alternative but to clean up its act. But the oxygen that allowed all this to happen is still alive in the Catholic Church.

Fr Eugene Duffy, a priest of the diocese of Achonry, in an article in the Furrow refers to how the merging of the dioceses of Achonry and Killala was a ‘hierarchical event’. He believes a far more synodal approach needs to be taken.

Fr Duffy says that the way the two diocese were merged shows how the church leadership talks the talk of synodality but doesn’t walk the walk.

And that’s how the hierarchical church continues to behave in so many areas of its life.

It would be interesting to do an audit of how much the Catholic Church in Ireland and, indeed, across the world pays in legal fees and compensation to victims. In the case of Ireland, that figure surely is available, as the Catholic Church is registered as a charity.

It’s relatively easy to apologise for historical events, and apologies are needed, but they sound hollow unless the behaviour of the church today complements those apologies.

A living language changing or simply bad grammar?

Commenting yesterday on RTÉ Radio on the results of last Friday’s elections a university professor said: “They could have ran .....” and later in the programme said: “They should have went early....”

Later on the same day an RTÉ reporter said: “.... they have went"

Is it simply a/ a sign that a living language is constantly changing, b/ the past participle is dying, or c/ the professor and the reporter’s English is not up to standard.

Almost 120 million people with nowhere to rest their head

Close to 120 million people worldwide were forcibly displaced in 2023, the 12th year in a row that figure has risen, according to the latest figures from the United Nations' refugees agency.

It means one in 69 people on the planet have been forced from their homes, either displaced to other parts of their own country, or across an international border. Just a decade ago, that comparable ratio was Just one in 125, meaning the proportion of the global population has almost doubled.

There are multiple factors driving these annual increases, Kelly Clements, the deputy high commissioner for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR.

"We've got wars and conflicts that wage on without a solution in Afghanistan, Syria, now Ukraine, Venezuela, Myanmar — those are the protracted situations. And then we have new crises and new wars," says Clements.

The conflict in Gaza, which exploded into the world's consciousness with the October 7 Hamas-led attack in Israel and the Israeli military campaign in Gaza, has displaced almost two million Palestinians according,  to the UN agency that aids Palestinians, UNRWA. 

War has been waging in Sudan for more than a year with more than 10 million people forced from their homes, according to the UN's International Organization for Migration.

With close to 120 million people with no one to rest their head, how many people have come to our shores looking for protection? 

The UK is an underlier when it comes to accepting refugees and asylum seekers, whereas Germany has taken more than its fair share.

Directly from the mouth of Oliver Callan

Yesterday morning Oliver Callan on his RTE Radio programme said: “The Vatican is an enclave of total corruption and the largest homophobic organisation in the world."

Did Russian-based hackers cause IR booking collapse?

The Irish Times reported on Monday that Russian-based hackers hit Irish website before Friday’s voting. Among the sites that were hit was Irish Rail's

On the Thursday before the vote Irish Rail’s booking system collapsed and was down for close to 24 hours. Was this the result of the hacking? Why did Irish Rail not inform passengers of the outage? 

Our words should express what we think

This week’s Medaihuis Irish regional newspapers’ column.

Michael Commane

Sitting across the aisle from me earlier this week on a train were a couple, probably in their 30s. The conversation was dotted every few minutes with ‘shut the f… up’. And it was the woman who was saying it. He seemed a nervous type and found it difficult to stay still for more than 10 minutes.

 

For two hours 15 minutes, at least from what I could glean, they really spoke about nothing that was in any way engaging. Am I being patronising saying that? I don’t think so.

The previous day I called on a man who is partially invalided. We usually hurl pleasant insults at each other, gossip about him and her and solve all the problems of the village, even the world.

But on this occasion I decided to go serious and told him straight out how I admire his attitude to his new situation. He now depends on other people to do many jobs for him and he can no longer walk independently to the local shop to buy what he wants. 

There was a moment of silence before he looked at me and admitted that he misses his independence, being able to go to the shop, fill his bag with his purchase, throw it over his shoulder and walk back home. 

It was a privileged moment for me because I knew he was talking deadly seriously. All the usual banter between us had been put aside just for a short few minutes as we both knew we were talking real and true words to each other. 

I have no idea how I would manage if a similar fate were thrown my way. I filled a bucket of coal for him and went on my way. Indeed, I was surprised I asked him if I should do that and was also surprised that he assented.

Oscar Wilde says: ‘Ultimately the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is conversation’.

Wilde is saying something of great importance but surely there are many different types of conversation.

We can converse about everything under the sun, from football to war but how often and with whom do we in our conversation express what we are really thinking? 

How much of our conversations are shadow boxing. We often use the expression, ‘he is a cute hoor’ to describe someone whom we know is talking out of both sides of their mouth at the same time, someone who can easily fool us with their words, saying one thing and meaning another.

Indeed, it’s often used in a complimentary sense about someone. If you think about it, isn’t that extremely odd. Surely our words should be used to annunciate what we mean. Anything else is a lie and deceit.

I’m reminded of all the going away celebrations I have attended and the words that are used to describe the person. Often it’s a mix of lies, truths and make-belief. Maybe it’s the same with obituaries, but what point is there ever in speaking badly about the dead. Then again, why not if it be the truth.

I’ve often been told to zip it, that I can speak my mind too easily, but might the world not be a better place if we spoke our minds in truth, kindness and respect?

More wise words from Wilde: ‘Conversation about the weather is the last refuge of the unimaginative.’ You could add many topics.

The new European Parliament lurches to the right

Macron calls an election in France, Marine le Pen’s party makes big increases. In Germany the far-right AfD are now the second largest party after the CDU, the Greens vote collapses, losing over eight per cent, and what is most surprising, people under 30 left them in droves. The new party founded just some months ago by Sahra Wagenknecht collects over six per cent of the popular vote, which is an extraordinary result for such a young party.

The ruling SPD have had their worst result ever, managing to garner only 14 per cent of the national vote.

Ursula von der Leyen expects to be re-elected as Commission president.

Hungarians in large numbers have turned their backs on Viktor Orban. And in Poland it’s been a good result for Donald Tusk’s coalition.

The overall early prognosis is for a lurch to the right in the next European Parliament.

‘We’re in 1938’: Putin’s war in Ukraine, lessons from history

Watching German television news on Friday evening and observing how the police were keeping the right and left apart in Mannheim, one had to be reminded of the chaos of Germany that led to the arrival of Hitler.

The demonstration took place in the city where a memorial was taking place for a policeman, who was killed in a knife attack at an anti-Islam rally. The suspect is a 25-year-old man from Afghanistan, who is living in Germany for over 10 years.

German President Hans-Walter Steinmeier attended the memorial service, where he criticised all forms of violence.

And then this article in yesterday’s Guardian.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/08/putin-war-ukraine-forgotten-lessons-of-history-europe?CMP=share_btn_url

What Hunter Biden’s trial tells us about the US

This article in The Irish Times yesterday highlights how egregious is everything to do with Donald Trump

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It is the universe’s little joke that America’s first trial of the child of a sitting president began four days after its first conviction of a former president.

Hunter Biden is not being persecuted. Nor is the president’s surviving son the victim of a rigged judiciary. If Biden Jr is convicted there will be no uproar about the weaponisation of the US’s courts. If, on the other hand, he is acquitted, all conspiratorial hell will break loose.

It is easy to forget that the US’s rule of law is still intact. Both Donald Trump and Hunter Biden have been given trials by jury with the right of appeal. No system of justice is beyond reproach. But in America, defendants remain innocent until proven guilty. It is the mark of a blighted political culture when one of its two main parties treats the rule of law as a partisan issue.

To recap, Trump was unanimously convicted last week on all 34 counts of falsifying business records to disguise election payments.

Trump afterwards called the presiding judge “a devil” and said he was the victim of a show trial. Almost to a person, his party echoed that line. The notable exception, Larry Hogan – the Republican Senate candidate in Maryland – was targeted for his effrontery. Hogan’s offence was to ask Americans to “respect the verdict and the legal process”.

In response to that, Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, who chairs the Republican National Committee, said: “[Hogan] doesn’t deserve the respect of anyone in the Republican Party at this point, and quite frankly, anybody in America”.

Rigged judiciary

In short, Republicans who reject the claim of a rigged judiciary are subject to cancellation. I have no idea whether Hunter Biden will be convicted. The “first son” is alleged to have lied on a federal form in 2018 to acquire a firearm illegally. His gun was handed in to the police 11 days later after Biden Jr’s then girlfriend – the widow of his late older brother, Beau Biden – had thrown it away. Hallie Biden was worried that Biden Jr’s crack habit would not mix well with possessing a revolver.The prosecution must prove that Biden Jr knowingly lied when he said that he was not using drugs when he bought the gun. His is the sorry tale of a political scion who in his own words had hit “rock bottom”. That Biden Jr also monetised his father’s name is a poor reflection on how Washington works. He made much of his money when his father was vice-president by joining the board of a Ukrainian energy company. With no special qualifications for that role, he was clearly hired because of his last name. Money will always try to buy influence. There is no sure guardrail against such abuse other than integrity.

By the same token, Jared Kushner would not have received $2 billion in Saudi investment for his private equity firm in 2021 were he not the son-in-law of the former president.

Americans can agree that their capital city is lacking in ethics. But disapproving of that is radically different to believing outlandish nonsense about Moscow-style show trials. The Trump and Biden cases are a tale of two parties. Biden could have spared his son his judicial ordeal by pardoning him – a tool that Trump used for political associates who were jailed. Biden could also pre-emptively pardon his son before his separate trial for tax fraud in California.

Biden Jr’s second trial begins in early September just as the formal US general election is getting under way. If his father is rigging the system, he has a funny way of showing it.

Steve Bannon, one of Trump’s former strategists (also a convicted criminal), once admitted that the Trump movement’s real enemy was the media. “The way to deal with them is to flood the zone with s**t,” he said. The more nonsense that is pumped out, the more easily a cynical public will damn everyone equally. Amid the rivers of effluence about Trump’s victimhood, it is easy to forget that he has almost certainly avoided trial for trying to overturn an election.

Later this month, the US supreme court will rule on Trump’s claim to immunity for anything he did while he was president. By prevaricating for months over what should be an open-and-shut decision, the conservative-dominated court has all but ensured that Trump will escape accountability.

Hunter Biden may or may not merit jail time. Ditto Trump in his hush money case. But these are mere sideshows.

One of the US’s potential presidents respects the rule of law. The other does not. Everything else pales in comparison. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2024

Michael Murpurgo expresses his worries for our world

 Writer of children’s books, Sir Michael Murpurgo was interviewed on Channel 4 news last evening.  He was speaking about peace in the context of the celebrations in Normandy honouring those who landed there 8o years ago.

He expressed his concern and worry about the world situation right now.

He said that his generation were the beneficiaries of the work and sacrifice made by those who fought to destroy dictatorship and fascism.

He expressed his hope in the younger generation and is confident that they are up to any challenges that should face them.

The interview is well worth watching and should be available on the Channel 4 app. 

The link is to a chat with Michael Murpurgo.

https://youtu.be/15z84FL9vkA?si=qFXUcqNx9w8k9oY0

German made weapons aimed on Russian territory

On the days western allies celebrate the 80th anniversary of the landings at Normandy Berlin authorises Ukraine to hit some targets on Russian soil with German-supplied long-range weapons, a move Vladimir Putin said would be a “dangerous step” that would ruin relations between Berlin and Moscow.

That world leaders were not at Stalingrad in February 2023 is another monstrous shame.

Instead they are hurling missiles at each other, no not correct, 20-year-olds are doing that for them as they wine and dine in palatial settings, Moscow, Washington, Berlin. London, Paris, Beijing.

The world is on the brink.

Some of the unwholesome tricks of the retailer

 Have you noticed how shops are pricing items with the Return symbol?

A four-pack 00 Guinness is priced in large print as €6.50, but written below that price in much smaller print is '60c deposit’. It can very easily be missed. Why do the retailers not include the deposit price in the selling price?

At present Lidl checkout tills contain large quantities of one and two cent coins. Why then if the shopper’s total is €20.18/19 do they round up and charge €20.20?

Small change maybe, but every one and two cent coin add up.

Many unrecognisable faces on the lampposts

There are elections in Ireland on Friday, local and European.

The posters across the country with mugshots and descriptions of the candidates but on not a word informing the electorate whether they are running for local or European seats. Why is that?

We have all been festooned with leaflets dropping in our letterboxes but has anyone had a politician call to their home?

And how many of the electorate are familiar with their local councillors? For many the only time they see them is on their picture on lamppost posters.

Strange times.

Are we a land of a thousand welcomes?

This week’s Mediauis Irish regional newspapers’ column.

Michael Commane

‘That They May Face  the Rising Sun' is a film adaptation of John McGahern’s novel. His mother died when he was 10 and his father was violent and physically abusive to his children. 

The young McGahern won a scholarship on his Leaving Cert results, which allowed him to train to be a primary school teacher in St Patrick’s College of Education in Dublin. He later studied at UCD and became a secondary school teacher and also taught at third level. 

Archbishop of Dublin John Charles McQuaid, had him dismissed from his teaching job. He considered McGahern’s novel ‘The Dark’ a work of ‘pornographic depravity’. It meant he was unemployable, he went to England for a time, working on building sites.

McGahern’s early years is a story of not belonging. A cruel place to be. Maybe something that can haunt us all our lives. So often we keep it hidden, afraid to mention it. 

The film is about life in rural Ireland in the mid-to late 20th century. It is about belonging.

The Ruttledges, a young sophisticated couple come to live in the village. He is Irish and a writer and she is probably German, an artist by trade. They are a kind couple, who fit in well in their new surroundings. 

They manage to be part of the small community. They find it easy to belong. 

Life beats its daily drum and the locals like and admire their new neighbours. They involve them in the daily gossip.

Home on holidays, John comes to visit the Ruttledges on a bicycle and just as he arrives at their cottage he bumps into an old friend. They are delighted to meet. They embrace. John feels in that moment he belongs in the village.

He is working in England with Fords. He gives that outward expression of being a happy punter, easygoing, who is enjoying the new bright lights of England, and the money too. He eventually loses his job with Fords. He thinks he can return and move back to his own place. But, no, there’s no place for him back in the old home. He dies a relatively young man. Everyone in the village pays their respects. 

Never a mention that there was no room for him when he was in need of one. Are they ashamed of their behaviour? I imagine it’s a dark secret, not to be spoken about.

John’s experience must haunt the Irish psyche, those who left and never felt at home when they left Ireland, felt strangers when they returned, belonging nowhere.

What about those, who today are forced to leave their homes under appalling conditions, leaving behind families and friends, turning their backs on the familiar? 

We pride ourselves as being the land of a thousand welcomes. Now when we have been called to do just that, it’s our privilege to welcome those who are in need. 

How would McGahern read, indeed, write about the present situation? I can imagine he would want people, whoever they are to feel at home, to belong here. Isn’t that what we all want for ourselves.  ‘Do unto others….’

Remembering Franz Kafka, who died 100 years ago today

Today is the anniversary of the

death of Franz Kafka (July 3, 1883 - June 3, 1924) He was born into a Jewish family in Prague and spoke and wrote in German.

His writings had a major influence on 20th century thinking.

RTÉ Radio 1 recalled the life of Kafka on a programme yesterday evening.

A quote from Franz Kafka:

"My job is unbearable to me because it conflicts with my only desire and my only calling, which is literature.... I am nothing but literature and can and want to be nothing else ... Nervous states of the worst sort control me without pause ... A marriage could not change me, just as my job cannot change me."

Bizarre comments made by India’s Narendra Modi

The marathon Indian election is coming to a close and counting begins on Tuesday.

Current prime minister, who is expected to be retuned to the top job in this election recently made some bizarre comments in a television interview.s

This is from The Irish Times yesterday:

In recent television interviews India’s prime minister Narendra Modi claimed not to have been “biologically born” but created by God and sent to India as his instrument to govern it.

He reasserted his divine status to the NDTV news channel on May 25th by stating that God had sent him for a specific purpose, and when that covenant was concluded, he would consider his work completed.

“God doesn’t reveal his cards,” Mr Modi said, “but he just keeps making me do things.”

Balancing urgency with diplomacy in the war against Russia

As the Russians continue to make progress in Ukraine and the war slowly but surely edges off western media outlets, Volodymyr Zelenskiy gives an interview to the Guardian team.

'Time is our life’: Volodymyr Zelenskiy on balancing urgency with diplomacy in the war against Russia.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2024/may/31/time-is-our-life-volodymyr-zelenskiy-on-balancing-urgency-with-diplomacy-in-the-war-against-russia?CMP=share_btn_url